The relationship between lexical and syntactic development in English as a second language

This cross-sectional study investigates the development of argument mapping in learners of English as a second language within the framework of Processability Theory (PT), se Pienemann et al. (2005). It explores empirically the mapping hypothesis in English L2 which has not been previously treated in any detail in PT. My interest in this exploration stems from the fact that the mapping of thematic roles (such as agent and patient) onto grammatical functions (such as subject and object) presents different degrees of difficulty for L2 learners. The study also explores the relationship between lexical and syntactic development. Following Lexical Functional Grammar (LFG), e.g. Bresnan (2001) grammatical constructions are lexically restricted in language learning (cf. Pinker 1984, Tomasello 1992 in L1 acquisition). Therefore, lexical ability may be assumed to be strongly related to syntactic ability. Especially lexical learning of verbs is important because it leads to the development of sentences, where more complex verbs are necessary to construct complex sentences. The chapter is organized as follows. The next section briefly explains the lexical mapping hypothesis and two sources of difficulties for argument mapping. This is followed by the presentation of a study investigating the lexicon-syntax relationship in Japanese learners of English L2, its results, and conclusion.